Large white space appears when tapping text input on iPad – installed app only

Bug reports
1

We have a user experiencing a visual bug when tapping into text fields in our Appfarm app on iPad. When a text input receives focus, a large white area appears on screen — seemingly as if the layout is making room for a soft keyboard, but the keyboard never appears. The white space takes up significantly more space than a keyboard would. See attached video.

Key observations:

  • The bug does not reproduce in a web browser — only in the installed app (PWA)

  • The bug is intermittent — does not happen every time, but occurs most of the time. Has been going on for at least 1,5 months. Possibly longer.

  • The user has tested on two different iPads and with two different physical keyboards — same result on both

  • Only one user is reporting the issue. Does not seem to affect other users. I cant reproduce the error on my iPad.

  • Keyboard settings have been reviewed and tested in various configurations without resolving the issue

  • A screen recording of the bug is attached

Environment:

  • Device: iPad Air 13" M2

  • OS: iPadOS 26.3.1

  • Keyboard: Apple Magic Keyboard for iPad Air

  • App: Installed (PWA)

Steps to reproduce:
Note: Im unable to reproduce it myself.

  1. Open the app from the home screen (PWA) on an iPad with a physical keyboard

  2. Tap into any text input field

  3. Observe large white space appearing without a keyboard

Expected behavior: Text input receives focus normally, physical keyboard is used without layout disruption.

Actual behavior: A large white area occupies the lower portion of the screen. No keyboard appears.

2

Sounds like a frustrating issue. Ran it through Claude and it concluded it is a known Apple/WebKit bug introduced with iPadOS 26.

What’s happening under the hood: when a text field gains focus in a PWA (home screen installed app), iPadOS incorrectly signals to the web view that a virtual keyboard is about to appear, which causes the visual viewport to shrink and the layout to reflow. The physical keyboard suppresses the actual soft keyboard from showing, but the viewport resize has already happened — leaving a phantom white space. The area is typically larger than a real keyboard because the viewport resize doesn’t match expected keyboard dimensions.

What can the user do?

  1. Restart the iPad — restarting is currently the only reliable way to reset the broken keyboard state in PWA apps. It won’t prevent recurrence but clears it temporarily.

  2. Open Safari, interact briefly, then return to the PWA — some users report this resets the keyboard state without a full restart.

  3. Use the app in Safari instead of the installed PWA — the bug does not reproduce in the browser. This is the most stable workaround until Apple fixes it.

  4. Check for iPadOS updates — Apple has been iterating on iPadOS 26.x; a point release may address this.

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